https://www.chelseafc.com/en/news/2020/03/23/long-read--chelsea-in-the-time-of-spanish--flu

Long Read: Chelsea in the time of Spanish ‘Flu

In a two-part look back to that time, club historian Rick Glanvill has the story of the Spanish ‘Flu and its impact on Chelsea Football Club…

Has football and Chelsea faced a scenario like this before? It is a question asked by more than a few people in recent days with the pause button pressed on the 2019/20 season for an as yet unknown length of time.

Of course there have been plenty of breaks over the years due to bad weather, with some of those prolonged, and war has intervened as well. But when it comes to a global pandemic having an impact on the sport, what became known as the Spanish ‘Flu just over a hundred years ago is the closest comparison.

However while there are some similarities between then and now, there are significant differences too. For a start, the Spanish ‘Flu was much more likely to make those the age of professional footballers seriously ill than the coronavirus of today, and the medical expertise available and measures taken were very different too, including those affecting football.

This is Part 1

Part one: How football kept calm and carried on despite the ‘Blue Death’

‘In 1918, the death rate in Britain exceeded the birth rate for the first year since Government started maintaining records in 1837,’ UK Foreign Office blogger Tara Finn noted a few years ago.

Well of course, you might think, because that was during World War One. Wrong. The high mortality was not for those who fell in battle, but those who succumbed to the Spanish ’Flu pandemic.

There are parallels and contrasts between the H1N1 strain of Type A influenza that emerged just over a century ago and the COVID-19 or coronavirus that is such a concern at the moment.

Today, football, in common with all organisations staging large gatherings, has taken a pause but in 1918 the game, already reduced in time of war to small regional competitions rather than the Football League, saw no reason to close its gates. In fact Chelsea competed for and won a trophy while the deadly ’flu raged on in 1919, and the national League resumed in September 1919 despite its lingering presence.
 

 

A packed Stamford Bridge shortly after the resumption of League football in 1919

Back then, little was generally understood or conveyed to the public about how the ’flu was transferred from one person to another, there were no proper vaccines, nothing like the National Health Service to handle the widespread outbreaks, and remarkably little government action to change the behaviour of the public.

Spanish ’flu was far more likely to lead to death than the current pestilence, and by 1920 almost a quarter-of-a-million people in Britain had died. And even as the mortality rate increased, war-time restrictions limited the reporting of the pandemic for fear of damaging morale. As a result, when neutral Spain’s King Alphonso XIII was infected it received huge coverage, so “Spanish ’Flu” is the name it has erroneously carried through the ages.

 

The man who influenced the name of a pandemic - Spain's King Alphonso XIII in 1910

Unlike today, the virus’s spread throughout the world in the last months of the war was accelerated not by international business or tourist flights but by troop movements to and from the battle zones. And it did not primarily hit the elderly hardest, as COVID-19 does, but young adults.

The first wave to hit Britain in May 1918 was virulent, but caused sickness rather than death. The second wave appeared around October 1918 and proved far more deadly and enduring.

People weakened by the virus quickly developed fatal conditions, especially pneumonia, even as it appeared they were actually over the worst of it. Some called it the Blue Death because of the colour it turned victims’ lungs.

What made matters worse was that prior to the NHS, many doctors were on war duty and the regionalised Local Government Board (LGB) was not geared up for guidance on health. In 1918 its chief medical officer, Sir Arthur Newsholme, actually drew up plans similar to today’s measures, such as preventing large assemblies of people or overcrowding on public transport, which would clearly have impacted on football and everything else. But he shelved them because war was the priority.

Public gatherings, including sports, remained unaffected. In London, tens of thousands must have passed on the ’flu at the Armistice celebrations on 11 November 1918, and the Lord Mayor’s Show two days earlier, a 5,000-strong cavalcade involving tanks, airplanes, and low-flying airships.

That month well over 100 fell to the ’flu in Chelsea alone. So heavy was the toll across the UK, especially on those aged 25 to 30 years of age, that funeral schedules stretched into the evening and bodies lay unburied for days.

As well as propagating false ‘cures’ (eat raw onions and porridge, gargle with salted water or even potash, and glug whisky), newspapers took it upon themselves to issue advice, including what we now call ‘social distancing’.

 

 

Take a less-crowded train or bus, they suggested, cough into a handkerchief, isolate the sick, and ‘give up shaking hands for the present, and give up kissing for all time.’ And though schools and factories in the capital remained open throughout the epidemic, libraries and post offices were fumigated daily to reduce contagion. Regional Sanitary Authorities claimed that ‘fresh air and cleanliness, both of person and place, are the keystones of defence’ against the virus.

It is such thinking that probably prevented football being shut down in 1918, and the idea of closure never seems to have been discussed, not even in Parliament. In fact, while the scourge was still prevalent in January 1919, football authorities busily attempted to restore pre-war normality. The FA announced the Football League would return the following August, and that international matches could soon be staged.

Remarkably, throughout the chaos, Chelsea regularly attracted 20,000-plus crowds to ‘London Combination League’ games at the Bridge from September to April, and embarked on a successful campaign in the London region version of the 1919 Victory Cup.

The Pensioners saw off Queen’s Park Rangers in the March quarter-final at the Bridge by two goals to nil, then whacked Crystal Palace 4-0 in front of their own fans at Selhurst Park in April. The final was played at Highbury on the 28th of the same month against Fulham, who were beaten 3-0, attracting a 36,000 crowd. Thanks notably to Harry Wilding, who scored in each game, Chelsea remain holders of that trophy.

All of this continued despite Tom Logan and Harry Ford being among those players reported as being escorted by the ‘Spanish Lady’. Thankfully, both recovered but December brought the tragic news that ’flu had claimed Chelsea’s former outside-right Angus Douglas, 29, who had made over 100 appearances for the club before joining Newcastle. Even closer to home, two of the club’s vice-presidents, both Members of Parliament, William Hayes-Fisher and William Joynson-Hicks, contracted but survived the disease. Other footballers who fell victim, though, were former Gainsborough Trinity winger Johnnie Pattinson, and Young, a Millwall half-back.

Chelsea squad 1913 - Angus Douglas is on the far left of the sitting down row wearing white

Football was not alone in keeping calm and carrying on. A General Election went ahead at the height of the pandemic in mid-December 1918, and West End theatres reported record takings the same month. Both seem unfathomable now.

Eventually the tide turned and new cases of influenza subsided. Overall around half the two billion people on earth and a quarter of Britons contracted the virus at some stage. It is estimated 20 to 50 million died worldwide of Spanish ’Flu-related causes, and 228,000 in the UK.
 

 

Two men advocating the use of flu masks in Paris in 1919

We are a lot better off than our forebears 100 years ago. Thankfully, lessons were learned. The LGB’s crucial failure to act with social isolation measures probably led directly to its powers being transferred to a new, national Ministry of Health in 1919, but it was another 29 years before the NHS was born.

 

Edited March 24, 20206 yr by erskblue

https://www.chelseafc.com/en/news/2020/03/24/long-read--chelsea-in-the-time-of-spanish--flu---part-two?cardIndex=0-1

Part 2.

Part two: The story of Angus Douglas, Chelsea’s ‘young Scotsman, fleet of foot’

The pandemic of 1918-20, known as Spanish ’Flu or the Blue Death, differed drastically from the present day’s COVID-19. The current virus, as we know, is most threatening to the elderly and those with underlying health problems. In contrast, a century ago older members of the population were more likely to be spared by the infection, which preyed disproportionately on those aged 25 to 30 years of age.

Perhaps surprisingly then, only a handful of active or former footballers were recorded among the estimated 228,000 claimed by the influenza strain. Sadly, the most famous victim was a 29-year-old Scotland international who had risen to fame a decade earlier as a teenage winger at Stamford Bridge: Angus Douglas.
 

 

 

Angus Douglas

By unhappy coincidence Angus died on 14 December 1918 just two weeks after Johnnie Pattinson of Gainsborough Trinity, another of the few footballers reported to have succumbed to the epidemic, which was then at its peak.

On Christmas Eve 1910 the two wingers had opposed each other at the Bridge with the Pensioners winning 3-0 and the hosts’ ‘young Scotsman, fleet of foot’ among the goalscorers. Eight years later they would be reunited on a tragic and now forgotten roll of honour.

That goal by Angus against Gainsborough was also noteworthy – across five seasons at the Bridge from 1908 to 1913, the young Scot netted just 10 times in 103 appearances.

Born in Lochmaben, Dumfries, on New Year’s Day 1899, Angus’s reputation as a game-changer preceded his joining Chelsea from Dumfries in May 1908. He had been a teenage prodigy at his hometown club, but his performances were all about loading the bullets rather than firing them.

As well as possessing great speed, Athletic News enthusiastically reported in August 1908 that the new signing’s ‘conception of his duties is clear and well-defined, as he demonstrated last year.’

 

Words about Angus Douglas from the Athletic News

He was 19 years of age, 5ft 8½ tall, weighed 10st 10lb, and the Chelsea of ‘Gatling Gun George’ Hilsdon fame beat off competition for his signature from Everton and Bolton. He was exactly the kind of crowd-pleaser who could keep the turnstiles spinning at a stadium that had been extended to accommodate a further 10,000 spectators that summer

The ‘fast and brilliant outside-right’ made his debut alongside England stars Hilsdon, Ben Warren, and Jimmy Windridge against Preston on 1 September 1908, and afterwards contested the right-wing slot with Billy Brawn.

 

Angus Douglas made his debut alongside George Hilsdon (pictured)

By 1910/11 the youngster was ascendant, wowing crowds at the Bridge and an ever-present in the FA Cup as the Londoners reached the semi-finals for the first time. It was already noted that ‘his one weakness is a marked disinclination to shoot,’ however. Instead, the flanker would dart towards the corner flag and cross or, more usually, cut the ball back for a centre-forward such as Hilsdon’s successor Bob Whittingham to spank home.

Thus armed by his wing-mate, Whittingham fired the 26 goals that powered David Calderhead’s team back to the top flight during the 1911/12 season. Angus’s fine work was rewarded with a Scotland cap, but as the following season in Division One unfolded he slipped down the pecking order. Nevertheless when he was sold to Newcastle for a shade under £2,000 in November 1913 it was described as a ‘great capture’ for the Magpies, and north-east reporters soon reckoned he was showing his best form before war intervened.
 

 

David Calderhead was the Chelsea manager at the time

By the time war brought a halt to the regular Football League in May 1915, Angus had become a crowd favourite and, at 26, was barely into his prime years. It is not clear whether he continued to figure for the Geordies in the regionalised football played up to 1919. But the Great War was hungry for munitions and the winger found work as a shell machinist at the Elswick Ordnance Company (later part of Armstrong-Vickers) on the banks of the Tyne, the other side of town from his Gosforth home. The work with heavy machinery was hard, and he lost a finger, not in an accident but from blood poisoning, so his role had to be downgraded.

This was an unhappy time all round: Angus’s mother had died back home in Lochmaben in February 1914, and his father soon followed in August 1916. He found solace in the company of local girl Nancy Thompson, who was seeking refuge from a physically abusive marriage. She had had her application for a divorce struck out in 1917, but on 3 April 1918 Betty Douglas was born, and for the purpose of the baby’s birth certificate her parents, Nancy and Angus, pretended they were married.

Any family bliss was short-lived, unfortunately. In early December, disaster struck as the young couple both went down with Spanish ’flu, confining them to bed in separate rooms. Angus’s uncle James Beck answered an emergency call to come down from Scotland to help out and kept a bedside vigil. After 10 days’ sickness Nancy, just 25, died of pneumonia on 11 December and Angus, who looked like he would recover, succumbed likewise three days later – leaving infant Betty orphaned at just eight months old. Here the story thankfully takes a happier turn. Raised by a maternal aunt on the Northumberland coast, Betty married in 1935 and died in 1991 aged 73. She has generations of descendants still living in the north-east who are immensely proud of her Chelsea footballer dad.

As to Angus, quite apart from being a key figure in the Pensioners’ first ever semi-final and second promotion, perhaps his greatest legacy in football was that his move to Newcastle in 1913 oiled the wheels to allow Nils Middelboe, the ‘great Dane’, to escape his commitment to the Magpies and start his famous career in west London the same week.